The Top 6 Mistakes in Modern & turn obstacles into opportunities for growth! This e-book has the seeds you need to grow your practice to new levels Common Mistakesability On and insight. the When Mat you refine your attention and embody the tips I’m about to give you, every practice can be productive – even when you don’t feel your best. Remember, questions are the beginning of understanding, so nourish your curiosity, be kind, and feel free to reach out! I respond to all Instagram DMs, so go here to follow me and ask away.

the top 6 mistakes in benjaminsears.yoga | @benjamin.sears Common Mistakes On the Mat

1. Lack of Precision in Your Practice It’s not enough to copy shapes. That’s a rat race. Precision is the key to progress and compassion, because if you practice to learn rather than perform, you develop a kinder practice.

To truly progress in practice, which means earning a clearer understanding of the beautiful mystery of yourself, you need to get why and how to apply tension to simultaneously build flexibility and stability. Yoga postures are essentially isometric holds - the movement within a posture is how you engage with the floor and your own edges.

How you activate within your practice is an ongoing conversation that gives you potent information about yourself, especially around what pieces of your body get over or under-utilized.

It’s time to find out more about the unique form that is your body, and start moving energy and intelligence through yourself instead of merely copying shapes.

how to put this into practice: Every time you make contact with your mat, or with one body part against another, think of the contact as a conversation, and make sure that both sides are working equally to support each other.

For example, tune in: How EXACTLY do you use your foot to support your hip, back, and everything up the chain?

Right now, with bare feet, bend one knee a bit and press your heel and the ball of one foot into the floor. Grip with your toes and watch how your arch lifts and inner ankle moves out of a medial (inwards) collapse. If you do this in warrior postures, lunges, etc., you will feel a chain reaction of engagement up your legs that moves your sitting bones towards each other, which lengthens your lower back by bringing the support of your hips right underneath you. This is what you want.

Often, it’s the little things that make the practice more challenging (in the way you want) and which make all the difference for you by creating a safer and more productive connection between body and mind.

This is what I mean by “precision in your practice.”

the top 6 mistakes in modern yoga benjaminsears.yoga | @benjamin.sears Common Mistakes On the Mat 2A. OVER / UNDER DOING IT Over/Under Breathing

Proper yogic breathing that will help you transform your practice and as a result, your health, is not as simple as “take a huuuuuge breath”.

In fact, a lot of Yoga teachers have lost sight of the original purpose of Yogic breathing: to make the breath as efficient and seamless as possible. There are different breathing techniques that support different moments in practice and help you stabilize or open your body – or down-regulate your nervous system.

Study of breath is as expansive as the study of yoga itself. Start small, but just remember that there’s so much to learn. It’s all very exciting.

how to put this into practice: You’ve probably been told to breathe into your heart and open your rib cage with an inhale in Yoga class, right?

Let’s try the exact opposite. Lie down on your back, knees bent, feet flat on the floor, hands on your belly. Inhale, and expand your belly into your hands and simultaneously, press your lower back into the floor. Exhale, press your belly below your navel towards the floor. This process should feel like you are tractioning, or lengthening, your lower back. This is called intra-abdominal pressure and it stabilizes your lower back.

Doesn’t it feel gooood?!

Ok, continuing this breathing pattern, bring your hands to your lower ribs, and use your hands to “close” your bottom ribs inwards, like a corset. Keep breathing and pressing your lower back down, lengthening your lower back, without flaring your lower rib cage.

On your next inhale, reach through the crown of your head without losing any of the previous instructions. Now you know how to direct your breath downwards and create support and lumbar decompression for postures like plank, , or to un-couple shoulder flexibility from spinal extension in downward dog, so each piece can do it’s part!

Different breaths fit different goals and you’ll soon see that breathing is a beautiful skill to refine. Stick with me, and I’ll help you make it both clear and simple as you develop your capacities.

the top 6 mistakes in modern yoga benjaminsears.yoga | @benjamin.sears Common Mistakes On the Mat

2B. OVER / UNDER training Are you a yoga tourist trying always trying out different practices, chasing the latest Groupon, and never getting anywhere – or are you so invested in only one practice that you avoid everything else?

The ultimate test of the POWER of a type of practice is not how good you are at what you always do, but how well you can handle something unfamiliar.

A truly effective practice develops self-knowledge and capacity that transcend a single sequence or style. On one hand, it’s absolutely important to stick with something and repeat it for a long time to learn about yourself through that particular process – but it’s equally important to know when to diversify, and how to use different practices to balance each other out.

Not one practice does everything, which is fine! Balance consistency with diversity and you’re good.

how to put this into practice: For this one you’re gonna have to do a little reflection.

In fact, one of my goals is to give my students the ability to problem solve – real empowerment! Go back two weeks and write down what you did for practice over that time; this will give you an honest answer as to how you’re spending your time.

Then, reflect on your primary practice: what are its strengths? What are its blind spots, or weaknesses? Once you have this information, you’ve taken a powerful step towards curating a complete practice.

the top 6 mistakes in modern yoga benjaminsears.yoga | @benjamin.sears Common Mistakes On the Mat 3. NoT HAVING A Teacher That Helps You Personalize The Practice

EVERYONE (myself included) needs help and eyes on their practice from time to time, and all bodies are different. This doesn’t mean look for excuses, but instead, get help when you need it!

A true teacher will help you develop strategies to work on the pieces that are uniquely challenging for you so that you can maximize growth and minimize injury.

Investing early on in some high quality education will save you wasted time, potential injury, and help you progress more quickly.

How to trust a teacher?

1. Your teacher should know how to break down your goals into smaller pieces so that you work at a level that is challenging but not damaging. 2. Your teacher should support you moving at your own pace, and while being encouraging, should not make you feel pressured or rushed. 3. Your teacher should keep your body in mind, not just try and squeeze you into shapes. Remember, the body is the object, not the posture. How to Put This into Practice: CLICK OR EMAIL [email protected] Simple! Write down something that you want to learn, and ask me to help you.

the top 6 mistakes in modern yoga benjaminsears.yoga | @benjamin.sears Common Mistakes Off the Mat

Now that we’ve talked about some of the things that can help you unf*ck your yoga when you’re on the mat, let’s review some of the things that can really help you improve your practice…off the mat. As you can imagine, your habits during the 22.5 hours that you’re not practicing are just as — if not more — important in determining your results. 4. Inadequate Nutrition Eating well is an essential part of taking care of yourself.

Most of us know this…but don’t know how to put it into practice. There’s so much preaching in the Yoga community about food and what makes someone spiritual, but no matter what you believe, your body needs support from adequate nutrition.

If you’re practicing a lot, your body needs protein and fat to support you long term. Don’t let anyone else’s beliefs hold you back from feeling your best.

How to Put This into Practice :

Check in with yourself: Do you feel strong? Do you recover and sleep well?

How about soreness? It’s fine to get sore from a hard practice, but do you feel like your joints hurt? How about your digestion? Is your body composition where you want it to be? Most of these issues, if you note any, can be resolved by improving your nutrition (and note that I did NOT say diet).

First of all, how much energy do you feel you have right now?

Are you using Yoga as your main form of exercise and feel like you’re not hitting your fitness goals? If you’re lacking energy and not hitting your fitness goals perhaps it’s time to challenge your beliefs about food… even just a little bit.

Try this: replace hard to digest, fibrous foods like beans and grains with foods high in protein and saturated fat like sustainably raised grass-fed beef, butter, and easy-to-digest vegetables and fruits.

the top 6 mistakes in modern yoga benjaminsears.yoga | @benjamin.sears Common Mistakes Off the Mat 5. No Strength + Active Mobility Training

As a Yogi, are you strengthening and mobilizing the parts of your body that yoga doesn’t? That’s not cheating on Yoga – it’s common sense, it’s important for your health, and it makes Yoga easier.

For example, Yoga doesn’t address the pulling muscles in your back and shoulders that balance all the pushing within a typical Yoga practice. Yet those stabilizer muscles help you to find healthy shoulder positioning for Downward Dog, arm balances, and even .

Yoga also lack internal rotation of the hip, which is really important to keep your hips happy long term by not only strengthening and toning your butt, but (ha) by creating space in the joint capsule. So, integrate mobility training that opens range of motion while simultaneously creating strength within that range, and you’ll make gains that last and have happy joints for the long run.

How to Put This into Practice:

Next time you do Tree posture, instead of holding your foot up with your opposite hand or letting it rest against your thigh, move your foot away from your body, let go with your hands, and see how high you can hold up your foot without using your hands; that’s your active hip external rotation.

The stronger you make yourself through all ranges of motion, the better your joints will function.

the top 6 mistakes in modern yoga benjaminsears.yoga | @benjamin.sears Common Mistakes Off the Mat

6. No /Breathwork Practice Hey guess what? It can be really hard to keep up a challenging physical practice and be nice to yourself at the same time.

I know this is kind of the point; learn to find peace within the storm and all that, but just like mobility work isolates individual joints so that they can work better in global movements like Yoga postures, meditation and breathwork connect you to a sense-memory of peace that you can store in your limbic system for use in your physical practice.

Physical practice and stillness practice work really well together, and each supports the other.

How to Put This into Practice:

Use my free loving kindness meditation at this link, and next time you do a physical practice, turn that loving kindness on yourself especially if you catch yourself in a loop of negative self-talk. That, my friend, takes real strength, a lot of practice, and it’s a mental and spiritual muscle you can build over time.

How cool is that?

the top 6 mistakes in modern yoga benjaminsears.yoga | @benjamin.sears Let's Wrap this Up...

Thank you for taking this time to invest in your practice, and learn how these ideas can help you progress your body/mind through Yoga.

I’m super passionate about helping my students connect the dots between strength and mobility training, meditation, breathwork, nutrition, and Yoga to create a relationship with exercise that can sustain you for life.

Please check out my YouTube channel for free tutorials, tips on improving practice, and lots more.

I’m excited to stay in touch with you, and I always answer DMs on Instagram, so please feel free to hit me up there if you have any questions!